


Where Your Loyalties Lie

by cadesama



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Expanded Universe, Star Wars: Original Trilogy
Genre: Canon Divergent AU, F/M, Imperial Family AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-22
Updated: 2015-08-22
Packaged: 2018-04-16 16:27:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4632102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cadesama/pseuds/cadesama
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mara is tasked with taking the Imperial Prince on an important mission.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Where Your Loyalties Lie

**Author's Note:**

> For #9.

Mara did not remember how old she was when she left her parents. She remembered the ozone sear of burning air and the far worse smell of cooked flesh. She remembered rot and red lights and the noise of the lowest reaches of Coruscant – and then the bright blue of the sky as someone, her Master perhaps, ferried her away from that hellhole.

She remembered the Imperial Gardens and the scent of blooming flowers. They were almost enough to wash away the horrors of her early life. If her Master had dwelled on that memory, light flowing down the great halls of the Palace, sculptures that awed and inspired even children, then perhaps she would think first of beauty and second of pain. But that was precisely the opposite of his intention.

The Empire, after all, was beauty from pain. Always second and always at a price.

But it was one Mara gladly paid, throughout her training and all her missions. The Palace was a lovely structure. Her Master taught her to hear the echoes of death that resonating throughout the halls, to make sure she was aware of precisely where she was, its history, and the hard fought battle against the traitors who'd once called it their shining Temple.

She wouldn't say that she called the Palace home. It was too cold a place for a word such at that and her Master hardly indulged that kind of sentimentality regardless. But it was the center of her universe as much as it was the heart of the Empire.

Losing the man who controlled it all had nearly been like dying herself.

Mara walked proudly through the Palace halls, expression shuttered and mind open to the imprints the Emperor had left on the space around her. Her new Master was known to shudder at the sensation, betraying his weakness, but she took the opportunity to harden herself with the exposure. It wasn't pleasant – Palpatine was neither a kind nor pleasant man – but it was familiar. She traced her fingers along the stone wall as she walked, grounding herself in the echoes of Palpatine's presence even as the light of his presence grew more distinct in her mind.

The room she found the Imperial Prince in had once been called the Room of a Thousand Fountains. Does what it says on the box, Mara thought sourly as she entered. The crashing noise of water overwhelmed everything. She didn't know how the Jedi had been able to hear themselves think in this place, let alone hear the Force, but maybe that kind of oversight was what had led to their demise. Certainly hard to hear anyone plotting a sneak attack in this chamber.

Prince Skywalker stood close to the largest fountain, eyes closed with a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth as the mist from the waterfall drifted over him. He was dressed pretty much as daddy would have it, Mara noted, rolling her eyes: black and more black. It was somewhat less ominous on Skywalker than on his father.

She briefly considered the idea of taking advantage of the noise and Skywalker's apparent inattention to her presence. While Vader had stripped her of the privilege of carrying a lightsaber – calling it a sacrament she was not worthy of – she did have her favorite holdout blaster strapped to her wrist, not to mention a vibroblade or two tucked into her boots.

Even the thought alone was enough to turn her stomach, shortening her breath and causing her to close her eyes, forcing away the feeling.

Unlike Palpatine, Vader had not meddled in her head to inculcate loyalty. She knew, unfortunately, she would hate him far less if he had. She'd have no choice in the matter.

He had merely made it clear where she stood in the Empire. Or, more accurately, where she knelt. When he'd purged Palpatine's final command to her, freeing her mind and making all of her Master's perfidious lies apparent, he'd offered her a choice. She could serve and maintain her position in the Empire, preserve everything of importance to her and make her life some one of consequence, or she could have nothing at all. Live with the knowledge that she had wrought nothing but suffering and all at the whim of an evil, vicious man that she missed like nothing in the galaxy.

Mara would never stop hating Vader for presenting her the choice in that way. She hoped she'd stop hating herself for deciding to stay.

"What about me?" Skywalker asked. He'd cracked his eyes open and cocked his head, angling a smile her way. "Do you want to stop hating me?"

"Not particularly."

"Well, that's encouraging," he said wryly.

He still had the small scar on his neck from the attempt she'd made in the aftermath of Palpatine's death. She couldn't say she regretted that even the bacta had not fully healed the wound.

"In what way?"

"You're honest enough that I'll probably be able to see it coming."

Mara shifted on her feet, glaring back at him in annoyance. That was honestly an affront to her professional pride, but Skywalker took even her irritation in stride. The problem was that the Prince was genuinely very hard to hate. She'd have to put more effort into it.

"You want to hear why I'm here, or not?" she asked impatiently.

He eyed her for a moment, slight frown on his face and distant look in his eyes. Using the Force, and clumsily at that. Mara could feel his power as he reached out, mind brushing past hers as he spoke briefly with his father.

Whatever it was they said, it lit a fire under Skywalker. He dropped the casual demeanor, straightening as he looked back at her.

"Mission?" he asked.

"Got it in one. We're heading out, Your Highness."

He grinned widely.

"It'll be good to finally get out of the Palace."

Mara nodded toward the exit and he took the cue, walking out ahead of her. It would have been indecorous to push him along, but Mara was willing to risk it if it meant spending even a few minutes less in his company. It didn't come to that, as he sensed her desire to get moving and made it double time out of the Room of a Thousand Fountains and into the halls.

"I'm surprised you're so eager," Mara said idly as they made their way to one of the lifts leading to the hangar bay. "Didn't think you liked flying against your Rebel buddies."

"Father knows better," Skywalker advised her. "He's not going to do that to me."

Mara scoffed.

The means by which Skywalker had come to the Imperial Court were still something of a mystery to her, as was his personal history. That he was the famed hero of the Rebellion and destroyer of the Death Star was well known, if not often spoken of in Court circles. People who did tended to die gasping. Beyond that, little was known and there was one very obvious, heavy breathing reason that people did not investigate.

But it wasn't just his ignominious past that made Skywalker stand out. He just… didn't fit. How in the world could the son of Darth Vader, current Emperor of the galaxy and all around asshole, turn out so utterly naïve?

Mara watched him as they entered the hangar, taking in the confident stride despite his almost self-effacing calm. He didn't act like a prince and while she knew he hadn't been raised for it, she'd known more than enough social climbers willing to throw themselves thoroughly into the privileges afforded them as soon as the first opportunity arrived.

Skywalker led her over to his private ship. Commissioned by his father, it was a sleek and shining J type Nubian. A little bit more svelte than the typical royal yacht out of the Naboo shipyards, Mara nonetheless had no patience for its ostentation. She liked to fly under the radar and it was a source of disappointment for her that her new Masters disagreed on that point. Vader, of course, had never been known for his subtly, but she would have expected better of a former Rebel. They were generally pragmatic in their tactics, if not their high-minded and woolly-headed goals.

"So, fill me in," Skywalker said. He walked around the exterior of his ship, hand gliding on its hull as he did a cursory visual inspection. Mara did not bother to follow and he had to pitch his voice louder from behind the engines, calling, "What kind of mission?"

"Rescue," Mara said shortly. "We have techs for this, you know."

"I like to inspect my own ship. Kind of important to staying alive, you know," he returned, popping his head out from around the starboard stabilizer to cock at eyebrow at her.

The point, unfortunately, was well made. Mara didn't trust her equipment to anyone. If at all possible, she saw to her own medical care.

"Who are we rescuing?"

Mara debated telling him the truth. He'd sense the lie immediately, but arguing with him about it seemed less annoying than dealing with his reaction right now. While she was deciding, she saw him crouch down on the other side of the ship, taking out a small set of tools from his belt. She sighed and rounded the ship to see what tinkering he was up to.

She hated that she'd spent enough time around them both to recognize what constituted a shared father-son hobby.

Lying would just mean more time with him, she reminded herself.

"Old friend of yours, it seems." She crossed her arms and leaned against the ship's hull as she watched him adjust the rear deflector's auto-set intensity matrix. "Shady character by the name of Han Solo. Seems he disappeared not long after you decided to claim your throne…"

"That's –" Skywalker jerked his head up, glaring at her. "That's not what happened."

She fished out a small datapad from a pouch on her trousers and snapped it open, pretending to review the dossier Vader had given her.

"No, pretty sure that's true. He disappeared. Apparently, the Hutts caught up with him and the Rebels wrote him off as a loss."

"I am not 'claiming my throne'," Skywalker explained tensely.

Mara looked up, meeting his blue eyes with unconcealed hostility.

"Not how it looks from here. Your Highness."

"You think I wanted to get captured?" he asked, boggling at her. "I would be out there right now with Leia if Vader hadn't caught up to me!"

That would have been borderline plausible as an excuse if Mara had heard it two years ago. Maybe even one. But it was a little late for "I got lost" as an excuse for setting up camp in the Imperial Palace. And, really, it didn't fly at all when it came to the fiddly little detail of murdering the one true Emperor of the galaxy.

"Then I guess you'll be taking this chance to fly away from here," Mara snapped.

Skywalker drew himself up to stand, hands relaxed at his side, even if one did brush against his lightsaber. His eyes were clear and solemn, jaw tight.

"Not when I still have work to do. My father –"

Mara cut him off with a derisive gesture. She didn't want to hear about him or his father. There were moments when she almost thought Skywalker wasn't the kind of hypocrite Vader was, but it seemed that he was just as ready to let her down as anyone else.

Your Master never did, she thought to herself. She clenched her eyes shut, forcing the thought away. She wasn't thinking it. She knew she wasn't thinking it. No matter Vader's power, he couldn't completely erase the decade of service she'd given to Palpatine, the tendrils of thought control he had left in her mind. She couldn't even say for sure it was the Force rather than her upbringing that made her ache for the certainty of Palpatine's power and guidance, horrible as it had been.

"Let's get this over with," she said over her shoulder.

Mara mounted the gangplank to the ship, waiting to hear Skywalker's feet pound up it before she walked to the cockpit, never glancing back at him.

He was smart enough to slide into the co-pilot's chair. If she was too bored during this flight, as black as her mood as just gotten, she might rethink her loyalties.

"You wouldn't do that," Skywalker said, addressing her thoughts. He didn't look at her as he spoke, hands moving on the ship controls to help with the pre-flight check. "You're nothing like you think you are."

"Just shut up and let me fly. We're meeting your Princess in less than a day, Your Highness, and I don't think she's going to look kindly on me if I damage the cargo."

Skywalker looks inordinately pleased that his father had arranged his mission to be in coordination with Princess Leia. Mara felt a stab of annoyance at that. If it were anyone else, Mara would think Vader was planning to nip the Rebellion in the bud with a convenient royal wedding. Irrational, she told herself. Vader was not that savvy a politician.

"Shut up and stop grinning," Mara told him.

"I didn't say anything!" he protested.

"Then just stop grinning."

He covered his smile with his gloved hand and Mara cursed herself for ever agreeing to this. It was going to be a long mission.


End file.
